The Power And Popularity Of Evita A Role Actresses Dream Of Has Become A Dream Come True For Jill Unger

November 29, 1985|by PAUL WILLISTEIN, The Morning Call

"Evita" gets around.

Productions of the hit Broadway show were presented this year at Valley Forge Music Fair, Riverfront Dinner Theatre, Huntingdon Valley Dinner Theatre and Bucks County Playhouse, to

name a few in the region.

Currently at Shepherd Hills Dinner Theatre, the show is breaking house attendance records. Next Wednesday, Act One at Allentown College opens its production, accompanied by the Pennsylvania Sinfonia.

How can you explain the popularity of "Evita," the Andrew Lloyd Webber- Tim Rice musical about Eva Peron, the charismatic wife of Argentina dictator Juan Peron? How can audiences revere a figure who chose Christian Dior over food for the starving? Just why is the public fascinated with "Evita?"

It has to do with the musical itself. Who can resist that mixture of bathos and bombast, "Don't Cry For Me Argentina?" Certainly not audiences who flock to see "Evita." Critics of the show have had their doubts, then and now. The music is a mixture of watered-down pop-rock. The storyline plays hob with facts. Although the character of Che Guevera, the Latin American revolutionary, represents the vox populi in the play, Che and Eva didn't share the same stage in life. Eva reigned as Peron's wife from 1946 until her death from cancer in 1952. Che and his guerilla band was a post-Castro Cuba phenomenon until he was killed by a firing squad in 1968.

Still, as pure theater, it's not easy to dismiss "Evita." It is powerful. This is mainly because the character of Eva so dominates the script. The nightclub singer, model, radio broadcaster and actress worked her way through a number of men until she met then Col. Peron in 1943.

It was Eva who urged him to try for the presidency. It was Eva who inflamed the passions of the workers who would become Peron's political base. After Eva returned to Argentina after a whirlwind European tour, she formed the Eva Peron Foundation which further elevated her status in the eyes of the people. Along the way, Eva made enemies, namely the military. She was offered the post of vice president. She declined and faded into ill health and died.

The role of Eva is the kind that actresses dream of. It has everything: dancing, singing and dying. For Jill Unger, a young Allentown singer-actress who plays Eva at Shepherd Hills, it's been a dream come true. Unger has been collecting glowing press clips ever since Richard Akins Productions opened "Evita" at Peddler's Village Dinner Theatre and moved it to Shepherd Hills.

"Unger's Eva is devastating," wrote The Jewish Times.

"In short, she is a knockout," said The Trenton, N.J., Trentonian.

"Jill Unger was, to put it mildly, incredible," wrote The Flemington, N.J., Democrat.

Eva is the first major area theater role for the 20-year-old, who has sung with Lehigh Valley rock group the Bottom Line; attended Berklee School of Music, Boston, and has been a soloist with the Allentown Municipal Band. Unger said she got the role quite unexpectedly:

"I was a brunette playing Rizzo in 'Grease' when Richard (Akins) asked me, 'Have you thought about Evita?' I thought he meant the role of the mistress. Then, he said, 'No, I would like you to play Evita.' " Unger had also appeared as Mary Magdalene in "Jesus Christ Superstar" for Akins.

Unger still had her doubts. But after working on the material with the show's musical director Gary Bartholomew, her confidence grew. It was also decided to portray Eva differently from the way she was depicted in the original show.

Unger said that when she saw Patty LuPone in the Broadway show, she thought that LuPone played it "harder. I didn't have any sympathy for her. In talking with David (Czarnecki, the show's artistic director), we decided to build more sympathy for Che and Eva. I tried to make it seem that she regretted that things had gotten out of hand."

In preparing for the part, Unger read eight biographies about Eva Peron. Still, she said, it was difficult to ascertain the truth since many of the books were authorized by Eva. What is certain is that Eva was known as "the woman who could bring the people to the heart of Peron."

But, Unger said, "she went about it in the wrong way. She turned into the kind of establishment person she hated as a young girl.

"I can't imagine a woman more unlike me. The only thing that Eva Peron and I have in common are our dark roots."

Unger's first show was "Godspell." She was in the 7th grade at South Mountain Junior High School. School theater competition at Bucks County Playhouse heightened her interest. At Allen High School, she sang with the Chorale and was a soloist with the Allen Jazz Band. She won a summer scholarship to Berklee School of Music.

Unger said her parents are pleased with her success in "Evita," especially her mother who gets to see her daughter in splashy evening gowns rather than the jeans of "Grease" or the tatters of "Superstar."

" 'Oh, you look like such a lady playing Eva Peron,' " Unger recalls her mother saying. Unger said she replied, " 'Mother, she was no lady.' "